NOTES AND QUERIES.
MAMMALIA.
Hybrid between Donkey and Burchell's Zebra.—Just before the mail leaves (April 5th), I want to give you the first information about the birth of a hybrid between a male American tame Donkey and a female Burchell Zebra. I cannot have a photo taken to-day, as the mail leaves in an hour; but you will have the first print of it. It is very little striped across the hocks and ears, and has a black stripe all along the back. The colour is a rich reddish fawn, lighter underneath; it has a white star, and four white feet, like the father. It looks strong and healthy, and is probably of great interest, as it may be able to resist tsetse-fly and horse-sickness.—J.W.B. Gunning (Pretoria Museum and Zoological Gardens).
Pine-Marten in Ross-shire.—On the 21st of April last a very beautiful specimen of the Yellow-breasted Marten (Mustela martes) was trapped in Ross-shire. It measured over thirty inches in length, and is of a uniform dark brown colour, except the breast, which is yellow. Some lambs were attacked in the district where this Marten was killed, and the people there think it was the work of this animal (?). It has been sent to me for preservation.—John Morley (King Street, Scarborough).
AVES.
Varieties of Blackbird, Thrush, and Starling.—During last winter I saw no fewer than four Blackbirds (three males and one female) with more or less white in the plumage, all from different localities in this neighbourhood; one of the specimens was peculiarly marked, the head and fore part of the body being white, and the hinder half of body and tail being the usual black. Also a Song-Thrush, almost wholly white, except a few dark spots on breast, and here and there a patch of the usual pale brown upon different parts of the body; tail of the normal colour, except the two middle feathers, which are of a dirty white. The appearance of the bird at first sight reminds one very forcibly of the Clouded Magpie Moth (Abraxas ulmata), as some of the spots, especially on the side of the neck, are much darker than others, which appear
